Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull yesterday scrapped knights and dames from the nation’s honors system, less than one year after a furore sparked by the award of a knighthood to Britain’s Prince Philip, the husband of Queen Elizabeth II.
Former prime minister Tony Abbott, a staunch monarchist, reintroduced the honors last year, provoking criticism that he was out of touch with public sentiment.
Abbott was ousted by Turnbull in a party coup in September.
The politically disastrous decision to give Prince Philip the nation’s highest honor — Knight of the Order of Australia, on Australia Day, has been cited as the beginning of the end for Abbott.
The decision by Turnbull, a former head of Australia’s republican movement, to scrap the honors might be interpreted as a signal of his willingness to revisit the thorny question of the nation’s relationship with the British monarchy.
“Knights and dames are titles that are really anachronistic, out of date and not appropriate in 2015,” Turnbull told reporters.
Australian Greens Party leader Senator Richard Di Natale welcomed the decision, even as he used it to mock the government.
“It says something about the standard of leadership in this country that installing knights and dames was one of the most significant acts of our former prime minister, and undoing that folly is so far one of the most significant acts of our new one,” he said in a statement.
Others who received the honors were former Australian governor-general Quentin Bryce and Governor-General Peter Cosgrove, former Australian air chief marshal Angus Houston and New South Wales state Governor Marie Bashir, which Turnbull has said they can retain.
Queen Elizabeth is Australia’s largely ceremonial head of state, but has the power to approve the abolition of parliament, which last happened in the controversial 1975 toppling of former Australian prime minister Gough Whitlam’s administration.
Australia’s sometimes strained relationship with the British crown came to a head in a 1999 national referendum, when almost 55 percent of Australians voted against breaking with the monarchy, defeating Turnbull’s republicans.
However, Turnbull’s move into the leadership has buoyed the hopes of republicans eager to revisit the issue in a fresh referendum, despite his ranking of the faltering economy, not the monarchy, as his government’s top priority.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese